Thank you for contacting me about heat pumps.
One of the hardest things to decarbonise is heat and I am convinced heat pumps have an important role in achieving net zero. An ambitious target of 600,000 heat pump installations a year by 2028 has been set which will benefit thousands of families with lower bills and greener electricity.
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) is supporting heat pump deployment through both the Domestic and Non-Domestic Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI). As of November 2020, the total number of Non-Domestic RHI accredited applications for heat pump based installations was 2,500 and 62,492 in the Domestic RHI.
BEIS is also providing support through the Future Homes Standard. This will ensure that new homes are built zero carbon-ready without the need for costly retrofitting and introduce a new market-based policy which puts industry at the heart of efforts to develop the heat pump market. This is evidence of the Government’s commitment to phase out the installation of high-carbon fossil-fuel heating off the gas grid through targeted regulation, and a range of other policies such as the Home Upgrade Grant and Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund. I understand the forthcoming Heat and Buildings Strategy will set out further actions which can be taken.
I understand there has been concern that bigger heat pump schemes will become ineligible for a grant. Having looked into this, there is some positive news. It is true that there are plans to restrict a specific grant to smaller projects. This is because they can struggle with the initial outlay associated with installing a heat pump. However, the good news is that there are two major new schemes for larger heat pump schemes.
A new £270 million Green Heat Network Fund will fund large heat pumps, solar thermal installations and waste-heat recovery in heat networks.
I am pleased that officials have met with representatives of the 'Pump it Up' campaign in which there was a discussion of the market for large heat pump projects.
Whilst heat pumps will have a very important role to play in many types of home for which they are appropriate, it remains important to recognise that heat pumps will not be appropriate for all homes. In Devon in particular we have a large housing stock of traditional stone buildings which lack cavity wall insulation and are in many cases not well suited to current heat pump technology. That is why I have been talking to ministers and industry bodies about alternatives, including low carbon heating oils and hydrogen heating. We must have alternatives that allow us to properly heat all rural homes whilst still achieving the emissions reductions we need, and I will continue to stress to ministers the importance of taking into account the needs of rural areas like ours.
Thank you again for taking the time to contact me.
